


Domestic Inclinations

by gwinne



Category: The X-Files
Genre: Infertility, Miscarriage
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-25
Updated: 2018-06-25
Packaged: 2019-05-28 11:35:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,146
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15048029
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gwinne/pseuds/gwinne
Summary: Set mostly during late Season 6, after "Arcadia"; spoilers for "DeadAlive," "Per Manum"





	Domestic Inclinations

**Author's Note:**

> This story began as a humble attempt to explain Scully's ever-changing decor and ended up incorporating the events of "Per Manum"

DOMESTIC INCLINATIONS

This is her routine. After the flight attendant brings  
their meal, after Mulder falls asleep, open-mouthed, across  
the aisle, she takes out something to read. There's a  
dog-eared copy of Benito Cereno in her bag, but she knows  
she's not going to read it. No, not today. Today, she  
pulls out Martha Stewart Living and Better Homes and  
Gardens. She also bought a copy of Working Mother from the  
newsstand while Mulder was in the bathroom, but she's not  
sure she's that brave.

She's just looking at the pictures, idly flipping pages and  
trying to imagine a home. Sometimes, if she lets herself,  
she even imagines Mulder watching TV in the hypothetical  
den while the hypothetical baby sleeps in the nursery  
upstairs. 

This has been building in her for a long time. Since her  
remission and reckless decision to adopt a dying  
three-year-old. Since Mulder leaned in to kiss her. Since  
he held her hand in the hospital, trying hard to make her  
laugh, but not so hard that she would rip open her  
stitches. In this post-cancer, post-gunshot world, she's  
finally ready to play house.

* * *

When they get back from California, she schedules an  
appointment with a reproductive endocrinologist. He takes  
vials of her blood, tests for levels of estrogen and  
progesterone. To a woman who hasn't ovulated in years, he  
makes getting pregnant seem remarkably easy. Donor egg,  
donor sperm, lots of synthetic hormones, and bam, baby in a  
petri dish. Petrie.

Of all names he could have chosen, why that one? Why  
couldn't he be serious for once? Her thirty-fifth birthday  
and she was horny as hell, and there's Mulder, cracking  
jokes. "Admit it," he said, "you just want to play house."  
And if the doorbell hadn't rung, she probably would have  
said, "you know, you're right, I do." 

They were back in San Diego, only miles from where her  
daughter's death was marked by an empty grave, where her  
nephew had just taken his first tentative steps across the  
kitchen floor. And if that wasn't bad enough, her period  
started a week early, a cramp-wracked reminder of her  
body's failure to conceive. So she threw a pair of gloves  
in his face and walked away.

* * *

"Hey, Scully," he says, swallowing an oversized bite of a  
turkey sub, "what do you know about beds?"

"Excuse me?" she says so quickly she nearly chokes. Then  
she remembers the odd moment that morning when he eyed the  
Pottery Barn catalogue alongside their report in her laptop  
case. He must have been gearing up all day to make a smart  
remark.

"You know. Rectangular, generally made of wood or metal.  
You sleep in them."

She opts for the appropriate neutral, verging-on-sarcastic  
response. "You, however, do not." She sets down the paper  
cup of iced tea and raises an eyebrow for good measure.

"Well, here's the thing." He puts his hand over his mouth  
to stifle a burp, and she can't help but think it's the  
right segue. "Since the waterbed sprung a leak, I've been  
sleeping on the couch. I'm too old for this, Scully. My  
back is killing me."

She pouts a little. It's days like this she's grateful to  
be back in the basement, talking about psychic surgery and  
men who turn into dogs. "So you're going to buy a big boy  
bed?" she says and gives him a genuine smile.

He nods once, cheeks puffed out like he did that day for  
Emily, pretending to be Mr. Potato Head. "And I thought  
maybe it would be a good idea if you came." He pauses at  
his choice of words, and she's sure she can see him blush.  
"Well, you are a doctor."

"I'm a forensic pathologist, Mulder, not a chiropractor."

"Yeah, I know, I just thought that it would be good to have  
someone who's actually slept in a bed for the bulk of her  
adult life with me when I make what will inevitably be a  
life-changing purchase."

"Inevitably." Six years of partnership has come down to  
this. She's already picturing dark sheets on a pillow top  
mattress, the dip in the center as his body curves towards  
hers. "How about Saturday?"

* * *

All week acronyms swirl in her head. FSH, IVF, hCG. The  
one she likes best: GIFT. It seems appropriate, given what  
she's about to ask.

* * *

"Why are you smiling?" She's trying to explain the  
importance of thread counts when buying sheets, the  
difference between sateen and Egyptian cotton and silk  
blends, and stops mid-sentence. Mulder's  
smiling--grinning, actually--and she has no idea why.

"You're good at this."

"At?"

"Mattresses, sheets, interior design."

"And?" There's a bit of fear mixed with the frustration in  
her voice.

"Don't take this the wrong way, Scully, but I just never  
saw this in you. You're not exactly domestically  
inclined."

"I see." She bites the inside of her cheek.

"No, no, Scully. I like it." He pauses, and she can tell  
by the set of his jaw that he thinks he'll regret what he's  
about to say. He'll say it anyway. He always does. "But  
after six years, you're still an enigma to me."

What is this thing that stretches between them? She  
contemplates the space between their bodies, the shape it  
makes in the evening light of his apartment.

She shrugs. "New hobby," she offers, which is as close to  
the truth she can tell him without actually telling him how  
she's been spending her days, what her hopes are. "After  
Arcadia, I decided to get some new furniture."

"I'd think after Arcadia, the last thing you'd want is new  
furniture. Just be sure your apartment complex doesn't  
have any CC and Rs that pertain to the color of your  
couch."

She shapes her mouth into something that resembles a smile  
and settles into the black leather. In the house of her  
dreams, his living room furniture stays in the den.

* * *

She's gone up and down the elevator three times already,  
rearranging words in her head like the wooden pieces of a  
Scrabble game. She's never felt so desperate, so reckless,  
so angry all at once. Totally hormonal, she thinks, though  
she's not sure which hormone is calling the shots. Since  
nine o'clock this morning, she has learned that Mulder kept  
her ova hidden like a family secret, vowed never to speak  
to her partner again, found out her eggs are, somehow,  
miraculously viable, and decided to ask her best friend to  
father her child. 

He has gone to the ends of the earth to save Scully's life,  
but will he give Dana the one thing that can save her soul?  
It's all too much. She knocks on his door with shaky  
hands.

"Scully, come on in." His voice sounds like it did that  
night in Oregon when she knocked on his door in her robe.  
"Can I get you something? Coffee? Water?" He has too  
much energy and she doesn't have any, standing in his  
doorway with keys heavy in her hand. She thinks of sperm  
cells swimming, frantic against the solid mass of the egg.

She wills herself to speak. "Got anything stronger?"

He nods once, acknowledging that this isn't a casual  
get-together, one of their non-dates when they eat greasy  
pizza in casual clothes and talk about anything but work.  
"I've got some bourbon around here somewhere. How does  
that sound?"

"Good. Thanks." She sits on the seldom-used chair in the  
corner of the room and listens to the sounds of Mulder in  
the kitchen, ice cubes clinking against glass. She catches  
herself taking an inventory of his possessions--the old  
posters, the cheap TV stand, the stacks of half-read books  
and magazines--that haven't changed since that first day  
they agreed to work at his apartment. He's still Mulder,  
the quintessential bachelor; how can she ask him to give  
that up?

"Here you go." Their hands brush as he hands her the glass  
and she trembles. She hates that he can do this to her,  
and she's glad she's still Agent Scully in her black suit.  
It's Dana who wants him to trade the fish tank for a baby  
carriage, Dana who wants to have a child. She takes a sip,  
holding the alcohol in her mouth. When she swallows, she's  
sure he can hear it across the room.

They're sitting in identical poses, shoulders tight,  
hunched over, jaws set. She sets the chunky glass on an  
old copy of the New York Times, the closest thing he has to  
a coaster. "Mulder," she finally says, "there's something  
I need, something I want. . . to ask. . . you, and I'm not  
sure how to say this. I've been thinking about it all day.  
. ."

"Just spit it out, Scully."

"Okay," she exhales. "I went to Zeus Genetics today.  
They're cutting edge, as far as fertility treatments go. I  
had them look at the specimen you gave me, and, the good  
thing is, it seems the ova are viable." She gives him a  
weak smile. This is the easy part, reciting facts the way  
she gives a report to Skinner.

"That's wonderful," he says, the way he says, "that's a  
wonderful theory, Scully, but do you want to know what I  
think?"

"But Dr. Parenti thinks it would be best if we got started  
right away." You're thirty-five, the doctor reminded her  
this morning; after thirty-five a woman's chances of  
conceiving drop considerably. My chances of conceiving  
even with medical intervention are already next to nothing,  
she wanted to say, so what's another month. "I know the  
timing is awful, Mulder, but I need to do this. I need to  
try." She's not sure when the tears started, but Mulder is  
on his knees in front of her, wiping her cheeks with his  
thumbs.

"Mulder," her voice cracks, "Mulder, I was really angry  
this morning but I think I understand why you did what you  
did. And the fact that you kept my ova after all these  
years, even after the doctor said they weren't viable, that  
says a lot." She leans down until her forehead presses  
against his. "Mulder, I want to do this but I can't do it  
alone."

He pulls away and cradles her chin in his hand. "Scully,  
whatever you decide to do, I will be there for you, you  
have to know that."

"I know. It's just. . ." She pauses long enough to slow  
her heart. She can feel her pulse thrumming in her neck.  
"I always thought that when I had a child it would be with  
someone I loved." She places her hands against the cotton  
of his shirt. "I want my child to know more about her  
father than his donor number and the color of his eyes."  
She pauses, drawing feather-light circles on his chest with  
her index finger. "Mulder," she whispers, "will you help  
me?"

"Oh, Scully," he says, never taking his hands from her  
face. "I don't. . . I don't know what to say."

"I know it's a lot to ask. I know it would change  
everything. Please, Mulder, just think about it."

* * *

When she opens the door, she's not surprised to find Mulder  
sprawled on her new couch, feet up on the coffee table.  
She sets her keys on the console, one of those pieces that  
always looks right in a catalogue but seems awkward once  
you get it home. Mulder, on the other hand, looks like he  
belongs here. All he needs is a remote control and  
basketball on a big screen TV.

"Well?" he asks impatiently as she hangs up her coat.

"Well," Scully says, willing herself not to smile. She  
can't allow herself that indulgence, not yet, when so much  
is subject to change. She shoves a few overpriced throw  
pillows out of the way and sits down next to him. "It's  
still too early to say anything for sure, Mulder, but they  
took some blood to see what my hCG level is."

"hCG?" he asks, as if he hasn't been reading up on invitro  
fertilization for weeks.

"Human chorionic gonadotropin. It's the hormone that  
indicates pregnancy, Mulder. And," she takes a deep  
breath, "my hCG level seems to be rising."

"It worked? You're. . .we're. . . ?"

"Yeah."

"Wow," he says, running his hands through his hair until it  
stands up. "Wow."

"Yeah." She smiles and places her right hand against her  
belly, as flat now as it was when she was eighteen and ran  
five miles a day.

"You feel okay?" He wraps his hand around hers, his thumb  
caressing her navel through the thin silk of her blouse.

"I feel great, Mulder. Assuming everything's okay, I can  
probably look forward to feeling sick in a week or so."  
His hand is warm against hers, and, for a moment, she  
thinks about what it will be like for the next nine months,  
sharing the daily changes in her body with him. She sighs  
when he pulls his hand away, wiping his palm against his  
jeans. 

Already everything has changed. She fears there's regret  
in his silence, heavy as her wool coat on this lovely  
spring day. "Well, how about I take you to dinner? You  
know, to celebrate?" 

"That sounds nice. Just let me get changed, okay?"

On her way to the bedroom, she squeezes him on the  
shoulder, a small reassurance that she's still who she was  
that afternoon, when she left him at work to itemize  
receipts. It's so strange, she thinks, a part of him is  
growing inside me and we've never even kissed.

As she puts on fresh lipstick, she marvels that she doesn't  
look any different, this new life growing inside her. She  
touches the small lines at the corners of her eyes, trying  
to remember when they first appeared. She knows some of  
Dr. Parenti's patients are much older than her, but  
thirty-five suddenly seems too old to be a first time  
mother. "You'll need to slow down, Dana," he said less  
than an hour ago, "especially during the first trimester."

When she comes back, Mulder is holding a small box in his  
hand, grinning like he does over a new case.

"Mulder?" she says in her cautious Agent Scully voice.  
"Mulder, what's in the box?"

He hands it to her and she weighs it in her hands. It's so  
light it feels empty, but it's the size of a box you'd put  
a ring box inside, just to make things difficult. She  
pulls the lid off, and there's a pair of tiny pink socks,  
the length of the foot no bigger than her thumb. They're  
as soft as the cashmere sweaters her mother used to wear  
when she was a girl. She fingers the tiny ruffles along  
the cuff. "Oh, Mulder," she breathes, "they're perfect."

* * *

Five days later, she's not surprised to find two half moons  
of blood on her underwear. A miracle, she remembers Mulder  
say, that was not meant to be. She's not sure how to tell  
him that the pregnancy is over before it really began,  
before the first tinge of nausea or fatigue. She's not  
sure how to tell him she doesn't know if she wants to do  
this again, like a child afraid to climb back on her  
two-wheeler after the first spill on the driveway. So she  
leaves a message on his voice mail and stays in her pajamas  
all day.

He shows up at six o'clock, holding a take-out bag to his  
chest.

"Hey," he says, as she shuffles back to the couch, stepping  
on the rolled cuffs of her pajamas. "You feeling okay?"

"Just a little crampy." She folds her legs under her and  
pulls a chenille throw up to her chin. She knows if she  
took her temperature it would be lower than it has been in  
weeks.

"Hungry? I got dumplings and that sauce you like." He's  
in the kitchen, rooting around for plates and silverware.

When he looks to her for an answer, she shrugs. She  
doesn't want him to see her like this but she doesn't have  
the energy to play stoic Agent Scully right now.

"Hey, Scully, what do you think of Hope?" he asks when he  
finally sits down.

"Hope?"

"For a girl."

"Oh, Mulder." She fills her lungs all the way, a deep  
diaphragmatic breath, and exhales slowly. "There's not  
going to be any baby. Not this time."

His response is a single nod, a gesture that could mean  
anything from "please continue" to complete disbelief.

"It's called a chemical pregnancy. The body produces the  
right hormones but the embryo doesn't develop. Most women  
who have early miscarriages don't even know they were  
pregnant. I wouldn't have known if I weren't being  
monitored so closely." 

"You're sure, then." His palms, raised to his mouth, are  
pressed together as in prayer.

"I took a home pregnancy test. Two, actually. Both were  
negative." She knows she'll crack like fine china if he  
lets himself cry, so she picks at invisible threads on the  
couch. If she'd gone to work, she might have been spared  
this conversation.

"So that's it? The baby plan didn't work out so it's back  
to business as usual?"

When she looks up, the first thing she sees is the hard set  
of his jaw. He's in fight mode, and she doesn't have the  
energy for this, not now, with her uterus tight as a  
clenched fist. "I didn't say that."

"I mean, I'm sitting in a meeting writing baby names on a  
sheet of paper while you're having a miscarriage and you  
don't even think about calling me?"

"It's not a real miscarriage, Mulder. There wasn't even a  
heartbeat." It's easier to tell him that, to tell herself  
that, than to think about the loss of the child that could  
have been. Mulder's daughter, Hope.

"Thank you, Dr. Scully. I feel so much better." He laughs  
a small bitter laugh and crosses his arms against his  
chest. She knows this is just the beginning.

"Mulder, can we please not do this? I don't have the  
energy to do this right now." Wedged between the couch  
cushions, there's a dime that must have fallen out of his  
pocket and a single used Kleenex. She swipes it  
deliberately under her eyes. 

"And when you do, you won't want to talk about it." She's  
been waiting all day for this, the moment he jumps up from  
the couch and paces frantically around the room, the moment  
he yells long enough and loud enough for her to let go. As  
he speaks, she shreds the tissue, bits of dust settling on  
her lap. "I'm good enough to jerk off into a cup so you  
can have one half of the necessary genetic material for a  
kid, but god forbid I ask you to talk about what you're  
feeling. I mean, what were you thinking, Scully? That I  
would disappear from your life the minute you got pregnant?  
We're *partners*. Does that mean anything to you?"

"Of course it does! And how dare you insinuate that I  
don't care about you or want you in our child's life." 

The pronoun reverberates through her like a blow to the  
chest. What slipped out of her body today was their child.  
To her, loss is tangible as a wrapped maxi pad in the  
trashcan. To him, it's an idea that fits in a miniature  
pair of socks. She swipes her drippy nose on the sleeve of  
her sweatshirt. "I wanted this baby, Mulder. I wanted  
this baby from the minute I asked you to be her father."

His body sags, and he pulls her against him when he sits  
down. "I know you did." He hands her a handkerchief from  
his inside pocket, a lingering habit from her cancer days.  
It smells like sunflower seeds when she lifts it to her  
face. "I'm so sorry, Scully."

"I am too." There's not an apology big enough to hold a  
loss as small and weighty as their combined cells.

They sit together as dusk turns to dark, bodies heavy  
against the couch cushions and each other. If this is  
domesticity, she's not sure she wants it.

* * *

When spring comes again, he asks her to go shopping. "Time  
to stop living like a frat boy," he says. "I mean, if I  
want my girlfriend to come over and watch a movie, I don't  
want to be embarrassed by the decor."

"I see." This is all so new--sharing bad movies and  
popcorn--and she's not sure she likes being his  
"girlfriend." A year ago, they thought they were having a  
child together. And when she finally got up the nerve to  
ask, he admitted he'd almost given her a ring that day. 

It's taken a year for her to catch up, a year to realize  
that kissing, love, and baby carriages don't always follow  
the order of the child's rhyme. It's taken a year for her  
to realize that Mulder's her family, whether or not their  
DNA ever combines in her womb.

"So what are we buying? A new couch?"

"What's wrong with my couch? I'll have you know that this  
couch is a chick magnet." He relaxes into the black  
leather, his long arm wrapping around to squeeze her  
shoulder.

"Well, Mulder, maybe you'd better find yourself a chick."  
She reaches up and runs her palm over the back of his hand.  
"You know I'm kidding, right? I have a lot of good  
memories on this couch."

"Oh, you do, do you? Well, how about one more?" He  
waggles his eyebrows and cranes his neck around to kiss  
her.

"Is this how you thought it would be?" she asks. She  
regrets it instantly, the question too heavy for a  
sun-streaked morning in May. She pulls his hand down from  
her shoulder to hold it, stroking his long fingers with her  
own.

"What do you mean?"

"You and me, together. Sitting on your couch on a Sunday  
morning, just drinking coffee and reading the newspaper."

"Sure," he pauses, and she knows he's trying to decide  
whether or not to tell her something. She knows, if she  
waits, he will. "Last year," he clears his throat, "when  
we really got started. . ."

"After the miscarriage?"

"Yeah." He shifts her onto his lap, and she snuggles  
against him, burrowing her nose into his neck. "I used to  
think about what it would be like being a family with you.  
I imagined sitting here on this ratty old couch or your  
fancy new couch and watching you feed our kid." He fills  
the space between sentences with long strokes down her  
back. "Those few days when you were pregnant, Scully. . .  
I wanted that baby so much. But being here with you now, I  
wouldn't change it for anything."

She kisses the salty place where neck curves into shoulder,  
feeling more at home than she has in a long time. "I love  
you, Mulder."

 

* * *

The next time she's pregnant is a lifetime away, after two  
more failed attempts at IVF, after Mulder has given her  
much more than semen in a cup. The next time she's  
pregnant, she's too busy burying her lover to worry about  
preparing a nursery or buying a layette. For most of three  
trimesters, catalogs from Pottery Barn Kids lie unread in  
the basket next to her coffee table.

Now, with just three weeks to go, she maneuvers herself  
around the apartment carefully, pausing to fluff a  
decorative pillow or arrange a throw over the arm of the  
couch. Her four rooms are starting to resemble a home, a  
bassinet in the corner of the bedroom, a sinkful of dishes  
in the kitchen. She's no Martha Stewart, but she thinks  
she'd like to share her mother's recipe for scones with her  
son, to make a scrapbook of autumn leaves with her  
daughter.

She's clearing out space in the dresser for Mulder, a  
drawer for a few pair of boxers and socks, an extra gray  
t-shirt, for those late nights he doesn't want to drive  
home. Since he's back from the dead and unemployed, he's  
been spending a lot of time at her place, the designated  
tall person to pull boxes from high shelves and assemble  
baby furniture, even though she's better with her hands  
than he. 

She's clearing out space for Mulder when she finds a small  
box shoved to the back of her underwear drawer, under some  
camisoles and satin nighties she hasn't worn in years.  
Inside, she finds the pair of baby pink socks Mulder gave  
her that first day they thought they might be a family.  
She turns them over in her hand a few times, thinking about  
the small feet she hopes to put in them some day. She  
hasn't told Mulder, but this time, at least, they're having  
a boy. Finally, she thinks, she has the home of her  
dreams.

FIN


End file.
